Meet The ‘Cafeteria Lady’ Who Wants To Become An Indianapolis Colts Cheerleader

The Indianapolis Colts cheerleaders are conducting an online contest for fans to pick a local girl to receive the opportunity to audition to join the squad. Basically, it’s a very nice way of saying, “Hi there, everyone thinks you’re great and now we get to decide that on our own, now go away everyone else.” It’s truly the democratic process at its finest. And while there are 68 girls on the online voting ballot, the buzz around this contest has been created mostly for just one 20-year old Colts fan.

Tella Toney is a lunch lady at Southridge High School, and while it sounds incredibly odd, she’s currently the favorite to win the Colts cheerleader audition, thanks to a ton of support from her friends, family and all of the students at her school. Admittedly, it’s a little strange writing about a 20-year female working at a high school and not including a mugshot.

Tella says the judges will allow the top-ten vote-winners to audition to be a Colts cheerleader in March. Right now, Tella leads the pack, with just over 4,500 votes.

“She showed me how to get to the website, where to go, and I’ve been voting daily,” said Oralee Cotton, food service director.

Oralee Cotton is the food service director at Southridge, and she says the whole food service staff is excited for Tella.

Cotton and Tella both say the students at Southridge are especially interested in the competition and that some are very surprised to have a ‘lunch lady’ like Tella.

“They’ve never had a lunch lady, as far as being this young, to do something that neat,” said Cotton. (Via Indiana’s 14 News)

To be fair, when we hear “lunch lady” it doesn’t necessarily invoke the greatest of imagery, as evidenced by the ghost of Chris Farley up there. But Tella is clearly not a stereotype:

Since that report, Tella’s vote total has jumped to 7,238, which is good enough for a 1,900 vote lead over Demi Z. on the Top 10 leaderboard. Normally, I’d try to be fair and impartial and perhaps tell people that my vote was going to another Top 10 candidate like Angela C. or Sally S or Angela C. Maybe I’d even champion an underdog amongst the pool of 68 and encourage our readers to vote for Allegra J. or Kristin R. by launching 200 websites and gathering the greatest SEO minds of this generation to conquer Google and force people to vote for Kristin R because JUST LOOK AT KRISTIN R. DAMMIT.

But Tella seems like a good person and she has great people around her, so hopefully she pulls this out, and she becomes yet another quality Colts cheerleader. Or maybe Kristin R. wins. What am I, Miss Cleo?

I guess anything can get on the internet!!! Go to [www.Indianapolis] colts.com and find out the REAL way to become a Colts Cheerleader!!!! Anyone may attend the tryouts and you make it on to the next round by judges who judge on dancing ability NOT on your votes!